AVM Shakti Sharma has become the first woman (non-medical) officer in the Indian defence forces to reach the two-star rank of Air Vice Marshal. She assumed charge as Assistant Chief of the Air Staff (Education) at Air Headquarters on Tuesday, the Indian Air Force said.

A new appointment at Air Headquarters

The portfolio she now holds covers the IAF's education and training policy, run out of Air Headquarters, New Delhi. The Indian Air Force called the promotion and the appointment together a historic milestone for the force.

No further details of the handover were released.

AVM Shakti Sharma's three decades in the Education Branch

AVM Shakti Sharma was commissioned into the Education Branch of the IAF on 18 June 1994. Her postings since then have spanned training establishments, field stations, command headquarters and Air Headquarters itself, a spread the force says has shaped her approach to the portfolio she now leads at the apex of that same branch.

A first from Sainik School Kapurthala

She earlier served as Principal of Sainik School, Kapurthala, the first woman officer from the Tri-Services to command a Sainik School.

Chairs of Excellence at IIT Kanpur and Pune University

Among the institutional initiatives she has led are the IAF Chairs of Excellence established at IIT Kanpur and at Pune University, meant to deepen academic and strategic defence collaboration between the force and civilian research institutions. The programme places serving officers inside university departments to work alongside faculty on defence-relevant research, an arrangement the IAF has expanded in recent years as it leans more on civilian academia for niche technical expertise.

Two-star rank in context

The IAF's own framing of the milestone, first (non-medical), points to an earlier precedent. Air Marshal Padma Bandopadhyay of the Medical Branch was promoted Air Vice Marshal in 2002 and became the force's first woman Air Marshal two years later, while serving as Director General Medical Services (Air).

AVM Shakti Sharma's promotion marks the first time a woman officer outside the medical stream has reached that same two-star rank. The appointment follows a run of IAF firsts for women officers this year, including the first woman to qualify as a Fighter Combat Leader, a wider push toward gender-neutral officer induction across the armed forces, and an all-women tri-service circumnavigation completed earlier this year.

More than three decades of service

Her career now runs to over 30 years, from commissioning in 1994 to Tuesday's appointment. The Indian Air Force and the Ministry of Defence confirmed the appointment through a Press Information Bureau release issued on Tuesday evening, filed from PIB Delhi at 6:01 PM. The release closed by citing the IAF's own line for the occasion, that she continues to inspire generations to touch the sky with glory, the motto the force has carried since well before this appointment.